


what you don't know

by epiproctan



Category: Promare (2019)
Genre: Didn't Know They Were Dating, Humor, M/M, Miscommunication, Post-Canon, Smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-31
Updated: 2019-12-31
Packaged: 2021-02-27 05:35:11
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,447
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22041910
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/epiproctan/pseuds/epiproctan
Summary: Lio Fotia knows his boyfriend is a dumbass.He had simply, despite extremely low initial expectations, underestimated exactly howmuchof a dumbass.
Relationships: Lio Fotia/Galo Thymos
Comments: 14
Kudos: 638





	what you don't know

**Author's Note:**

> i’ve had this fic sitting around completed and edited for months and i just wanted it on ao3 before the end of the year lmao

Lio Fotia knows his boyfriend is a dumbass. 

He had simply, despite extremely low initial expectations, underestimated exactly how  _ much _ of a dumbass. 

And no, this is not about the time Galo tried to impress him by shoving an entire pizza in his inhumanly large mouth at once. Or the time he boisterously insisted on changing the name of their apartment because Lio moved in with him. Or the fact that he thinks their apartment needs a name in the first place. 

No, this is about a completely different level of dumbassery. A much more personal one. A much more...frustrating one. 

Galo’s legs are thick and warm where they’re tangled in Lio’s. There’s a huge calf hooked behind Lio’s knee, a thigh twice the size of his against his own. Galo’s arm stretches across the back of the couch just inches above Lio’s shoulders, and Lio’s hand looks innocuous and dainty and small where it rests on Galo’s bare abdomen. 

They  _ were _ going to watch a movie, something mindless to unwind from a long and exhausting day of both physically reconstructing a city and repairing the society that was meant to inhabit it. Something to momentarily quiet the insistent voice that surely sieges the back of Galo’s mind just as it does Lio’s that there is still work to be done and people to help. But instead of doing that, they had ended up arguing about whether or not “firefighter action/adventure” should or shouldn’t be considered its own separate genre of film, and in the process they’d somehow ended up curled up together. Now, Galo halfheartedly flips through his digital collection of movies with no apparent intention of choosing one.

It’s the perfect setup, really. The lights inside the apartment are dimmed. Beyond the window, the night is softly speckled with the glimmer of starlight and recently-repaired streetlamps. Things are quiet, and soft, and Lio’s face is so close to Galo’s when he looks up at him that his nose nearly brushes along his sharp jawline. 

“Hey,” Lio says. 

Galo turns his head too, and now Lio can feel Galo’s breath on his cheek. The dark glow of the television screen reflects in his eyes and it twists up Lio’s chest in a kind of sharp eagerness, nervousness, that he isn’t used to feeling. It’s strangely pleasant.

“Hm?” Galo says. 

Lio parts his lips, licks over the bottom one, but doesn’t say anything else. 

Galo’s eyes drop to follow the motion, and then flick back up. 

Lio’s hand slides down Galo’s stomach, just an inch. His pinkie brushes the jut of a hipbone. 

Galo’s eyes widen. His cheeks color.

Lio tilts his head. Lowers his gaze. 

He moves in for the kill. 

Or is about to, except Galo opens his mouth and says, “Oh, did you decide what movie you want to see?” 

It’s a little like getting hit in the face with a freezing bullet. Halted in his tracks with pure brute force. Brought up short, unable to respond for a long moment with anything other than his eyebrows lowering. 

“What?” he asks. “No.”

“Okay,” Galo says, elbowing him aside to pick up the remote again. “Well think about it more, alright?”

Lio falls back against the couch cushion with a small, exasperated huff. 

He wishes this was an isolated incident. 

He wishes this has only happened once, but no. This has absolutely happened more than once. In fact, it’s happened every time. Every single effort he’s made to make his relationship with Galo more physical has been rebuffed. Every kiss he’s leaned in for, every steady touch to Galo’s waist, every suggestive comment and smoldering look, has somehow ended up misinterpreted, rerouted, diverted, or unnoticed. He’s being cockblocked by his own boyfriend.

It’s not intentional. Or, at least, it’s not for lack of desire on Galo’s part. Lio knows that. Galo isn’t nearly as quiet in the shower as he probably thinks he is. 

It really just boils down to pure stupidity, he thinks. 

Lio used to sometimes wonder about Galo’s dating history, but he doesn’t anymore. It’s pretty clear that Lio is his first, because he can’t even pick up on the most obvious, most basic of advances. He’s starting to consider looking up where in this demolished metropolis he can get a flashing neon sign that reads  _ I want to fuck you _ . 

After all, if the time Lio had invited Galo to watch a movie together in his bed when he was dressed in nothing but his tiniest briefs hadn’t been straightforward enough, surely the way Lio had thrown his thigh over Galo’s lap had been. But Galo had remained perfectly gentlemanly. Insisted on watching the movie, only to talk all the way through it. He’d whooped when the good guys won and cracked stupid jokes and asked questions about the plot that had been already answered five minutes prior. But unlike every single thought that crossed his pea-sized brain, he’d kept his hands very much to himself. 

The baffling part is that it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure out how to touch a man. If it did, only Heris would be having sex, and Lio sincerely doubts that’s the case. All of this should be animal instinct, essentially the simplest thing a human can act towards except maybe eating. Even Galo should be able to handle this.  _ Should _ . 

But he doesn’t. And in the meantime, living with this man is torment. 

Every night when Galo comes out of the shower, fat drops of water dripping from his hair and sliding down his thick shoulder and back muscles, he doesn’t seem to notice the way the towel he wraps around his waist does nothing to conceal the hard cut of his hipbones or the imposing lines of his thighs. Lio feels an itch in his fingers, in his palms, in his tongue, to trace them past the folds of the cotton. 

“Put on clothes,” Lio tells him, but of course to Galo that only means a pair of pajama pants, or when Lio is particularly unfortunate, shorts that probably fit him much better long before he’d joined Burning Rescue. 

Although Lio has a bed of his own, half the time he ends up in Galo’s anyway, or vice versa, and there is absolutely nothing pleasant about waking up in the morning achingly hard with his face shoved against Galo’s bare chest. Galo is a clinger, and Lio has woken countless mornings to find their bodies folded perfectly together. When it’s not that, he’s tormented by dreams of spilling over those beautiful, defined pecs. 

The searing urges that filled Lio from the Promare felt like nothing compared to this. Is it so wrong that he has to look at his boyfriend’s bare, impressively muscular chest gleaming under the sun every day, to see his pants riding so tantalizingly low on his hips, and wants to jump him? Isn’t this what relationships are supposed to be for? Having a person you’re incredibly attracted to, despite your better judgement, and being able to put your mouth and your hands on them? 

They’ve already kissed once. There’s no reason why they shouldn’t be kissing more often. Every day, if Lio is honest with himself about what he wants. And more than kissing, too. Way more. 

Something has to give soon. He’s led a terrorist organization, set fire to the Earth, and rid the planet of a destructive alien lifeform. It’s funny that after all that, this is the obstacle that he finds most frustratingly insurmountable. 

* * *

It happens often enough now that Lio has more or less gotten used to it: he and Galo are stopped on the street by someone who recognizes them. More often than not it’s a grateful ex-Burnish, someone who was there that night wanting to thank them, though the rude insults Lio sometimes has had hurled his way aren’t anything new. 

(What is new is the way Galo won’t ever let it slide if it happens within his range of hearing, but Lio figures that the resulting scenes that Galo causes are what he signed up for when he decided he wanted Galo to be a permanent fixture in his life.)

Today, though, he’s lucky enough that the interruption is pleasant. The middle-aged woman had seen them strolling past her storefront and called out to them, introducing herself as one of the Burnish who had been involved in the Parnassus incident and thanking them profusely for their actions. She’d been set up here with her own little apartment and shop by the Burnish reintegration project that Lio is spearheading, she told them, and she wanted to give them a little something to thank them personally. Since Galo can be convinced to do anything with just a little flattery and Lio’s soft spot for ex-Burnish can be seen from space, they’d followed her into her cozy bakery. 

Now Lio watches the woman bustle around, holding an easy back-and-forth with Galo about how courageous he’d seemed that night, which of course he’s eating up with alternating responses of cocky pridefulness and humble nonsense maxims about bravery. She’s boxing up breads and cakes and pastries as she goes, and Galo doesn’t seem to notice as his enormous arms continue to be laden to straining with sweet-smelling bags. 

“Well, here you go,” the woman says, placing one last packaged pastry atop the mountain in Galo’s hold. Even with Galo’s voracious appetite, there’s no way they’ll be able to eat all of this before it goes stale. Lio’s already planning what of this they’re going to bring by Burning Rescue as he peeks into some of the bags. 

“We’ll have this with dinner,” he tells the woman, gesturing to a still-warm loaf of olive bread. “It’s been a while since we’ve had anything this fresh. Thank you.”

She gasps. “Surely Lio Fotia and Galo Thymos are eating only the best the city has to offer!”

With a dry grin, Lio decides this is a good time to take Galo down a peg, before the praise goes to his head.

“Maybe we would be, if only my idiot boyfriend would learn how to cook something besides burnt toast.”

Lio slides his gaze over to Galo, fully expecting some good-natured banter in return, or at least a protest, but Galo’s mouth is snapped shut and his eyes are wide and he’s staring at Lio like Lio just casually mentioned that he has no interest in Edo period firefighting practices.

Which, now that he thinks about it, is strange that he does. This man has completely ruined him. Lio sighs. 

“Let’s go home, Galo,” he says.

He thanks the woman again and heads towards the door. When Galo follows him, it’s after a vigorous shake of his head, like he’s trying to physically clear his mind. He stays quiet all the way back to the apartment, and once he’s deposited the absurd amount of bread and pastries in the kitchen, he’s unusually silent as he sits on the couch. His gaze is distant, his forehead creased and his hands steepled at his mouth as if he’s deep in thought, though Lio knows that can’t possibly be the case. 

Leaving him alone to whatever his current inner turmoil is, Lio makes himself busy around the room, tidying up the little bits of chaos that Galo seems to leave behind him wherever he goes. As he turns from lining Galo’s boots up with the rest of their shoes by the door, he thinks he briefly catches Galo’s gaze on him. Then again, as he’s picking up an empty coffee cup from the side table. And again, when he wipes Dorito crumbs from the counter. 

It’s as he’s bending to pick up one of Galo’s discarded shirts from the floor that he actually manages to catch his eye and hold his stare, his expression deeply troubled.

“What?” Lio says. 

Galo opens his mouth, brow furrowed deep. Nothing comes out for a long moment.

And then,

“Hey, Lio,” he says. “You have a boyfriend?”

Lio snorts, unamused. It’s not a funny joke, but he’ll give Galo that much for the attempt. 

“Who is it?” Galo asks, doing a good job of looking genuinely lost and a little bit distraught. “Meis? Gueira?” His expression twists. “Ugh, don’t tell me it’s someone from Burning Rescue!”

Okay, it’s getting even less funny by the word. But fine. Lio will play along. 

“So what if it’s someone from Burning Rescue?” he says.

Galo spreads his fingers before him and counts off on them, mouthing numbers as he goes. 

“Remi has a girlfriend….” He puts one down. “Varys?”

Lio crosses his arms and rolls his eyes. If the tiniest smile slips through, definitely  _ not _ in response to Galo’s antics, that’s not his fault. 

But Galo’s expression is quite the opposite as he counts along on his fingers. He’s looking more and more troubled by the second. 

“Ignis?  _ Vinny _ ?”

Lio huffs, despite the smile growing stupidly on his face. “Don’t be an idiot.”

But Galo looks agitated now. His left hand tugs anxiously at his hair while his right hand is still extended in front of him, a single finger left uncurled. He looks at Lio, helpless, like this is some complex algebra problem and if he doesn’t solve for  _ y _ immediately he’ll burst into flame. 

So Lio, who’s beginning to feel uncertain if he’s playing along or not, raises both his eyebrows, and points expectantly towards the last finger still standing. Galo looks from Lio, to his finger, back to Lio again, eyes wide and round as saucers. 

“Who’s that?” Lio prods. 

“Me,” Galo says.

Unimpressed, Lio keeps his gaze leveled.

“Me?” Galo repeats, voice shocked hoarse. 

Then, louder, with his diaphragm, “What?  _ Me _ ? I’m your boyfriend?”

This is too over-the-top. Too serious, too genuine. Lio frowns. 

Is it possible that Galo  _ actually _ doesn’t know that they’re dating?

But that’s ridiculous. They go on dates three times a week. They fall asleep on top of each other on the couch every time they sit down. They  _ moved in together _ , for fuck’s sake, even if that was mostly because Lio didn’t quite know what to do with himself after everything that happened and there weren’t many places to go that weren’t burned-out shells of buildings. 

Any good humor Lio was just feeling evaporates and is quickly replaced with rising bafflement.

“Are you serious?” he says. “Of course you’re my boyfriend. You kissed me.”

This seems to do the impossible job of shutting Galo up for a moment. He frowns and cocks his head to the side.

“When? Wh— That...was a kiss?” 

Lio feels his expression scrunch up despite himself. He puts his palm to his face in exasperation. 

“You put,” Lio says, enunciating every word, “your mouth. On my mouth. For an extended time.” He lets his hand slide off his face and looks up at Galo, feeling strangely exhausted. “Don’t think that just because I was dying I didn’t feel you trying to slip me some tongue.”

Galo has the gall to look taken aback, and then he pinkens straight up to his ears. Despite his best efforts to not find it mortifyingly charming, Lio’s heart gives a particularly vigorous pump in his chest. 

“You did that to your friend, though!” Galo says. His volume is rising from its usual bellow, and Lio doesn’t know if it’s meant to cover up embarrassment or something else. “Don’t tell me you two were—”

“Don’t be ridiculous.” Lio crosses his arms over his chest. “I was just trying to save her life.” 

It’s then that the icy trickle of realization begins to leak into the back of Lio’s mind. It starts as a mild itch at first as his brain snags on something he just said. He tries to swat it away and focus on the conversation currently unfolding in front of him as Galo visibly begins gearing up to say something that will surely be spectacularly stupid, but it grows and grows until he can’t ignore it any longer. 

Lio had just been trying to save that poor girl’s life. 

Galo had witnessed him do that. 

Galo had assumed, probably correctly, that when confronted with a dying Burnish his best option was to copy his actions. 

Galo hadn’t  _ meant _ anything. His technique had been tender, intimate, and prolonged, but given that he’d never done anything like that before it was likely that he had no frame of reference for that. 

_ Who’s the dumbass now? _

Lio can feel heat rising in his cheeks and prickling at the corners of his eyes, and rather than deal with that or whatever nonsense is currently spewing out of Galo’s mouth with rising volume, he turns abruptly on his heel and walks out of the room. 

* * *

Lio’s phone rings. 

At first he considers not answering it, but he’s somehow still responsible for the lives of hundreds and figures it’s probably best to see who it’s from. He finds with some relief that it’s not Galo. But it  _ is _ Aina, and that’s possibly somehow even worse. 

He picks up.

“Yes?” 

Instantly, Aina’s voice fills the line.

“Is Galo okay? Did he slip in the shower singing karaoke and pull down the curtain rod on his head again?”

Lio frowns. “Why?”

“He ran down here with the dopiest grin on his face and kept asking if we knew you were his boyfriend.” She sounds vaguely irritated, but that’s nothing new. “I was like, that’s dumb even for you. How could we not? You two never take your hands off each other.”

Lio doesn’t quite know what to say to that, so he doesn’t say anything. 

“I’ve seen him get moony over you before but this was next level,” Aina goes on. “Anyway, after we all told him that of course we knew he suddenly seemed to be in a big rush to get out of there. It sounded like he wanted to go talk to you for some reason.”

Ugh. Lio does not want to  _ talk _ . Lio wants to launch himself directly into the Promare planet, as quickly as possible. 

“Hey, where are you, by the way?” she asks. “I’m worried he’s going to go on some crazy wild goose chase looking for you but—”

A distant hum distracts Lio from the rest of Aina’s words, and he fights to not instinctively look over his shoulder towards its source. 

“He’ll find me,” Lio says. 

“Are you sure? I’m a little worried—”

The humming gets louder and becomes the roaring of an engine.

“I’m sure.”

“Ugh, you two are the worst,” Aina replies.

Breaks squeal, and the engine’s buzz cuts off.

“I have to go,” Lio says.

Aina’s still complaining as Lio hits “end call” and returns the phone to his pocket, and he figures he’ll get an earful for it later, but he doesn’t care. He stands there, motionless, over-aware of the heavy footsteps quickly approaching behind him. He doesn’t turn to meet them. 

“Lio!” 

There was a lake here, once. Now it’s just an enormous crater, filled with scorched and churned earth, twisted burnt debris and caved-in structures poking up through the mud far below. It’s not pretty to look at, and there’s a chilly snap to the air up here that never would’ve bothered Lio before. Now it does, but as he inhales deeply, it smarts against his nasal passages and keeps him alert. 

The footsteps draw up next to him, and with them comes Galo Thymos. 

“Lio!” he says again. 

“What,” Lio replies. 

Galo straightens up. He’s breathing hard and his cheeks are red, like maybe he’d exerted himself in the process of getting here. He still has no shirt on, and Lio makes the monumental effort to not get distracted by how the cold has hardened his nipples. Isn’t this public indecency? 

But Galo takes no notice of his own body, nor the completely unimpressed look Lio is trying to keep steadily on his face. He simply raises a hand and points an accusatory finger in Lio’s direction. 

“You,” Galo starts. “Y-you.” He points to himself. “Me.” He gestures between them. “We’re....” 

Lio waits for the rest of the sentence, but it never comes. Regardless, it’s obvious that he’s trying very hard. Lio can practically hear his brain matter making its best attempt to spark to life. It wounds him deeply that he finds it endearing. 

Lio crosses his arms and looks out over the ruined landscape. He takes a deep breath. 

“How could you not know we were dating?” Lio asks. 

“How could you not tell me we were dating?” Galo fires back, twice as loud. 

“You should have known,” Lio replies, low, but even as he says it, he knows it was his mistake for expecting Galo to understand anything on his own in the first place. 

Grumbling in irritation, Galo closes the remaining distance between himself and Lio a few steps, but Lio isn’t done yet. He turns to face Galo head-on.

“I can possibly understand missing the kiss,” he says, “but did you really find nothing strange about us living together? Sharing a bed? Going on dates? Spooning?”

Galo looks at him sharply. “Wow. We  _ do _ do all those things, huh?”

“Yes. We do.”

Lio waits for that revelation to sink in. None of this should come as a surprise, but of course the categories of “things Lio considers to be obvious” and “things Galo considers to be obvious” have little overlap. Galo’s expressions pull at his face as he works through his thoughts, and eventually, he settles on contemplative.

“Hey, then how come we haven’t, y’know, kissed or had sex or anything?” 

Lio’s eyes widen, incredulous. 

“Are you serious.”

Galo, frowning now, nods.

“I’ve been  _ trying _ !” Lio says.

“You have?”

“Yes!”

Galo rubs at his head, looking uneasy, eyes distant, like he’s suddenly reexamining the past several weeks of his life. “Wait, so all this time, you really were trying to get me to kiss you? And that stuff?”

The noise that comes out of Lio unbidden is beyond exasperated. “What did you  _ think _ I was doing?”

Not that, apparently, because Galo’s eyes widen and his cheeks flush pink. If Lio wasn’t so frustrated and embarrassed he would want to study that expression, to capture it in his mind’s eye forever. Galo, flustered, does unfair things to his heart in his chest. 

“Wh-whoa. Really?” 

“Really,” Lio says. 

Galo pinkens further, somehow. It reaches all the way up to the tips of his ears, bold across his cheeks and his nose, over his chest. 

Lio hates that he’s so weak to this man.

It’s a good thing Lio has never had any doubt in the fact that Galo likes him. Of course he does. It’s written clear in the way he’s changed the orbit of his entire life to completely revolve around Lio. The core belief that Galo feels the same way about Lio that Lio does about him is unshakeable at this point, despite all of this. 

But if Lio had ever had any doubts, if he had ever thought for a second that this could possibly mean that Galo didn’t want him or crave his body just as desperately, the broad, overjoyed grin that comes to split his face as this fact settles in for him would probably be proof enough. 

“You’re my  _ boyfriend _ ,” he says, with a bizarre amount of self-confidence for someone who is often wrong about a lot of things. 

“Thank you for finally noticing,” Lio replies. 

“You, Lio Fotia, are my boyfriend!” Galo looks at him, marveling, wondering. “We’re like Lio de Galon! Joined together by the bonds of affection and—”

“Do we have to do this?” Lio asks. His own face feels warm, and he crosses his arms over his chest.

But Galo barrels on, chin high, chest puffed out. He grins, something wide and beautiful, and seeing it stretched across his face strikes deep into Lio’s core and makes him melt.

“Lio,” Galo says. “We can do that stuff now!”

“What stuff?” Lio asks. 

“Y’know, uh.” Galo scratches at the back of his neck, still smiling, and then looks vaguely out towards the horizon, as if maybe the words he’s looking for are in the near distance somewhere. “Kissing and everything.”

God.  _ God _ . What a beautiful, loveable idiot. 

“You made me wait all this time,” Lio says, “and now you decide you can kiss me, just like that?”

Eyes bright, Galo turns his sunny grin back on Lio, effectively knocking all the air out of Lio’s lungs. “Yeah!”

The smile that tugs at Lio’s mouth can’t be stopped. He feels helpless to it, warm all over, and maybe even that weird concoction of nervous-eager that he’s wholly unaccustomed to. It churns not unpleasantly in his stomach, and as he takes a step closer to Galo he’s overcome completely with the burning desire to kiss him.

Which is good, because he can.

“Hold still, then,” Lio says. “It’s my turn.”

Galo freezes. Does as he’s told. As best as he can, at least. Lio catches the quiver of his hands where they’re fisted at his sides, the way his eyelids flutter before closing completely. It’s painfully cute, and Lio pauses for a moment before slipping into motion himself just to take him in and indulge the reckless pitter-patter of his own heart. 

It takes him rising onto his tiptoes to reach. He lifts his arms and places his hands on Galo’s shoulders, partly to steady himself and partly just to touch him. There’s a thundering in his ears, but it’s nothing compared to the way his entire body seems to be singing in anticipation, a piano string tuned tight and waiting to be played. 

Lio tilts his head, closes his eyes, and brings their lips together for the second time. 

The sensation is familiar. He remembers this: the feel of Galo’s lips, the rasp of their dryness and their width and their warmth, though this time the press of it isn’t accompanied by the pain and terror-exhaustion of hovering on the brink of death. And yet he’s flushed through with the same life-giving energy, vitality zinging down his spine, sparking through his nervous system, like Galo is breathing fire into his core just like he did that night. 

It must be the same for Galo. He shivers, all the way down his body. Lio pulls away, just an inch, to read his expression, to make sure he’s okay, but Galo immediately chases after, crashing back into him. The force brings them closer, opens them up, and suddenly Lio is pressing in harder than he’d ever meant to. He’s met with just as much power. 

Instinctively, he lets his arms slip around Galo’s neck, tugging himself closer. Their chests meet, and Galo cranes to make up for the way Lio’s knees tremble as he begins to lose his strained footing. Galo’s arms sweep around Lio’s waist, holding him steady and still and secure, and Lio lets himself be supported. 

“Be shorter,” Lio says when he breaks away. 

Galo’s delighted laugh is quickly muffled into Lio’s mouth. 

Lio loses track of time like this, but what he doesn’t lose track of is how every time he thinks Galo can’t seem more eager, every time he thinks he can’t feel more on fire, one of them tilts their head or moves their tongue or nips in just the right way and it does. It gets to the point where Lio begins to feel more desperation than his body can contain. He’s finally touching Galo, but it’s nowhere near enough yet. Not enough to put out the roaring flame that he so effortlessly kindles in him. 

From what Lio can tell, Galo is in much the same state. He’s a little noisy, a little handsy, and when Lio presses against him in just the right way he sighs. His pants aren’t doing much to disguise how he’s feeling. Lio  _ knew _ Galo was big, but feeling him hard against his stomach is a whole other, life-altering experience. He doesn’t want to wait any longer. 

Lio pulls off, but keeps his arms looped around Galo’s neck.

“Take me home,” he says. 

* * *

The mattress creaks as Galo’s full weight lands on it at once, his back flat to it. Lio barely pauses to take in the sight of it: Galo, already disheveled, lips dark, sprawled back against the blankets. He’s too eager to clamber over him, to straddle Galo’s waist impossibly trim waist, to whip his shirt up over his head. It lands somewhere behind him, but he’s not paying attention to that. He’s only paying attention to the way Galo has opened his mouth as if to say something. Surely something stupid. 

“Shh,” Lio says before he has the chance, and swoops down to make sure his tongue is otherwise occupied. 

Lio is not wholly surprised that Galo is initially an overenthusiastic, too-wet, unrefined kisser, but he seems to relax monumentally when Lio grabs both of his hands in his own and places them on his hips. Galo’s fingers flex there, as though testing Lio’s small frame, and his mouth opens and his posture relaxes and he lets Lio lead him into something more natural and warm. And he’s not bad after that. 

Actually, he’s good. It’s good. Lio is appreciative of the fact that he’s kissing Galo again and he’s not unconscious for it this time and it feels really, really good. Up close here, Galo’s scent is especially potent, all warm familiarity with a constant smokey undertone that Lio associates with comfort and home and Burnish flames. His tongue is thick in Lio’s mouth and Lio opens for him, lets him explore, before chasing him back with a nip that only serves to spur him on more. 

Broad hands slip downwards. The motion is tentative at first but Lio cants his hips into it and Galo gets the hint and suddenly they’re squarely on the meat of Lio’s ass, fingers digging in just a little bit. Lio smirks into the kiss. 

“Go ahead,” he says, moving his lips to Galo’s jawline. “Take them off.”

He feels the bob of Galo’s Adam’s apple as he swallows under his lips, hears the hitch in his breath, and then feels his eager, thick fingers scrabbling to get a hold on the fabric. Lio lets him do the work of grappling at his buttons and zippers and peeling his pants down, stretching them over his hips and ass, before Lio shimmies them the rest of the way off and kicks them over the side of the bed.

“Whoa! You’re not wearing underwear,” Galo says, eyes huge, looking up resolutely into Lio’s face as though struggling to keep his gaze from wandering. 

Lio grabs the elastic waistband of Galo’s pants and gives it a hard tug, baring Galo to the room. He wonders if anyone else has ever seen him naked in this context before, and he thinks not. 

“You’re not either,” he replies.

And slides himself down the bed. 

He snuggles himself between Galo’s formidable thighs, rests his chin in his hand, and takes a good look. Galo is exactly as thick and beautiful as he’d always imagined, the size of him here perfectly meeting, if not exceeding, all of Lio’s expectations. Lio won’t pretend he isn’t impressed, even as Galo makes a choked-off noise above him and throws both his hands over his face. Lio can see that the tips of his ears are turning red, and they haven’t even started yet. 

“Don’t cover your face,” Lio says, reaching out to take Galo in hand. He’s heavy and hot against his palm. “Look at me.”

Galo makes a strangled noise like Lio is asking him for some monumental favor, but his hands slide off his red face. His eyes settle heavy on Lio, and just that, somehow, sends an electric shock down Lio’s spine. 

“Good boy,” Lio says. He wets his lips and opens his mouth. 

At this, or maybe the touch of his wet tongue to the head of Galo’s cock, Galo curses loudly. It’s funny enough that Lio grins to himself, pauses to press a kiss to his slit, before poking his tongue out again and swirling it around him. The whining, drawn-out sound of his name brings his eyes back up to Galo’s face, but it’s just Galo being Galo, desperately red, begging and questioning and praising all at once. 

As he bows his head, Lio’s hair swings into his face and sticks to the corner of his mouth, and he pulls off to use his free hand to tuck it back behind his ear. Some of it immediately slips free, but it’s worth it for the choked sound that such an innocent motion pulls out of Galo. It’s cute, as is everything else about him. He’s vociferously responsive, just like Lio suspected he would be, and every noise from him makes Lio want to push him down his throat further. 

So he does. Circling his lips tight around him, he lowers himself down around Galo until the thick end of him hits the back of Lio’s throat. He swallows around him and Galo groans. Lio glances up at him as if to ask if he liked that, but Galo’s face is so red and his gaze is so fixed on Lio it’s impossible to think that he didn’t. He looks like he could burst into flames at any second, which is something Lio has intimate experience with.

He wonders if Galo has ever had his cock in anyone’s mouth before, and knows immediately without asking that the answer is no. Somehow that thought spurs Lio on, makes him want to ruin Galo more. Even if he has nothing to compare it to, he wants him to know deep down that nothing will ever be better than this. Wants him to never consider doing this sort of thing with anyone else, because he knows that no one can make him feel as good as Lio can.

Galo, in his infinite stupidity and goodness, deserves that. 

Lio’s jaw is already beginning to protest from the stretch, but enduring pain is a well-honed skill at this point. He slides up the shaft and then down again, not breaking eye contact as he goes. Galo is too large to reasonably ever fit entirely in Lio’s mouth, so he breaks off to tongue at the base, spit dripping over it so when he grips it his hand glides along it easily. Like that, he gets his lips back around the head, focusing his efforts there while stroking the rest of it. 

Galo enjoys that. His thighs twitch near Lio’s ears, his hands grip the sheets, and he’s given up his babbling for heightening moans. Part of Lio wants to be mean, to bully him, to draw this out until he’s begging, but now that it’s established that he’s allowed to do this, he decided that there will be time for that later. Right now he wants to wring this pleasure out of Galo, give him what he deserves, see exactly what he can coax out of him. He wants to make Galo come.

So he redoubles his efforts, stroking faster. Galo’s cock jerks in his mouth, and he presses his tongue under the head, then drags it up and over, and then sucks, and Galo’s whole body convulses around him. 

When Galo comes, it’s shouting Lio’s name. Lio keeps stroking him, catching most of it with his tongue, but Galo’s hips jerk hard and his cock slips free, spilling over Lio’s lips and chin, sticky and warm where it lands. It drips down his chin as he slows to a stop, and he lets the mess sit there long enough to make sure Galo’s gotten a glimpse.

“Whoa,” Galo says, sounding completely dazed, like he’s just been slammed into a brick wall and had the wind knocked out of him. His head falls back and he blinks at the ceiling slowly, clearly trying to reorient himself as Lio wipes across his face with the back of his hand. 

Leaving one last kiss to his hipbone with his dirtied mouth, Lio sits up and climbs his way over Galo’s body. He settles on his waist while he thinks about what to do next. He’s still hard, and though he could easily demand Galo’s help with that, maybe it would just be quicker and easier and less hassle to jack himself off onto Galo’s chest and face, or— 

Two hands grab at the back of Lio’s thighs with unmistakable confidence. Before Lio has time to completely settle himself down, he’s being tugged up the length of Galo’s body until his knees nudge beneath his bulky biceps and he’s straddled just under his collarbone. He looks down in surprise and finds his cock resting against Galo’s chin, which, if Galo’s broad grin is anything to go by, is exactly where he wants it. 

“It’s my turn,” Galo says, his expression prematurely smug. “Just you wait, Lio. I’m about to rock your world. You’re not going to know what hit you!”

Lio laughs, making himself comfortable, taking himself in hand to smear precum across Galo’s waiting lips. “Well, stop talking and do it then.”

Galo’s tongue at first is testing, exploratory. He leaves broad, wet stripes across Lio’s head, down his shaft, which feels fine until Lio gets impatient and snatches Galo’s chin between his fingers. 

“Open up,” he says, and Galo is quick to obey. 

He’s a little clumsy at first. He doesn’t seem quite to know what exactly to do with his tongue or how to deal with the bulk of Lio in his mouth. But he’s eager, and after a few soft, guiding motions from Lio he seems to get the idea. He makes up for it with pure enthusiasm, giving every messy movement his all, drool escaping from the corners of his mouth, his fingers tightening against the muscle of Lio’s thigh. And Lio watches him all the while, his own hands braced on the wall above his head, breath coming harder as Galo begins to pick up the pace. 

“Ah—ah,” Lio says, a little breathy. “Watch the teeth, Galo Thymos, or I—ah—”

Galo responds instantly, and even just that sends a burst of arousal through Lio. He’s both careful and greedy, wholly concerned with Lio’s pleasure, with laying attention on the part of his body that he’s currently holding in his mouth. Like it’s something precious, something to treasure but also to eagerly use. Lio runs his thumb over Galo’s wet bottom lip, brushing against where he disappears into him.

Then, with the same hand, Lio caresses up Galo’s cheek and threads his fingers between the strands of Galo’s hair. Galo makes a responding sound in the back of his throat. Lio lets his fingers flex, slowly tightens his hold on the hair, and the sound persists, deepens. It makes Lio want to hold harder. 

“Hah, Galo?” Lio says, smile growing. “You think you can take this?”

Under him, Galo makes a sound that Lio knows would be some mouthy proclamation of his own abilities if his tongue and lips weren’t otherwise occupied. His eyes have gone flinty where they stare up at him through eyelashes from beyond Lio’s hand between them, and Lio knows Galo wants nothing more than to face this challenge head-on. 

So he sinks his fingers in further, grips just a little bit tighter, holds the head in his hand still. And then, slowly, he begins to rock his hips. 

The first few motions are met with some resistance. Galo’s not used to this, not used to the kind of relaxation in his jaw and his throat that it takes to let this go smoothly, but Lio keeps his movements steady, gentle, works himself at an even, easy pace until Galo’s jaw drops farther and he relaxes into the movement. His hands grip hard at Lio’s waist, fingernails digging in, and his eyes shine where they stare up at Lio.

Lio thinks he can make tears gather in their corners, but he’s too busy watching where his own cock keeps disappearing between Galo’s reddening lips. He picks up the pace, spurred on by the appreciative hums that have restarted in Galo’s throat, as though he’s genuinely enjoying this, like he loves being held in place and fucked into. 

“That’s it,” Lio says. “That’s it, Galo, yes—”

He’s beginning to go lightheaded with just the image of it, of Galo’s mouth around him, but then he gets in a particularly good thrust and Galo’s throat relaxes and it feels, suddenly, like Lio’s reality is crumbling. He chases the sensation of that, of Galo’s throat constricting around him, of the overwhelming pleasure it sends zinging up his spine and down his thighs and tightening in his gut. 

He’s not going to last long like this. It’s almost pathetic how weak Galo has him. How the shine in his eyes as he looks up at Lio bent over him makes his toes curl just as much as whatever it is he’s doing with his tongue. How his darkening lips make Lio’s thighs tremble. The noises he makes, appreciative and pleased and near-constant, making Lio feel like there’s nothing he would rather be doing than this. 

It all comes to a head suddenly, unexpectedly. Lio prides himself on his solid stamina until he’s there and gripping Galo’s hair harder and all his muscles have tightened at once and he’s saying Galo’s name in a voice he doesn’t recognize, tinged with desperation, frantic to squeeze every ounce of pleasure from this feeling. And Galo, determined and energetic as he is, works Lio through it, not stopping even as Lio comes down his throat. 

It quickly becomes too much, and Lio, breathing hard, heart thundering, pulls Galo off of him. Some cum-mixed saliva escapes from the corners of Galo’s mouth as he does, but Galo doesn’t pay that or the way Lio’s wet cock drags across his lower face any attention. Instead he beams up at him. 

“How was that, Lio?” he asks. “Amazing, right? You can praise me, it’s okay.”

Lio smiles. It was pretty amazing, but he’s not about to tell him that. 

“Idiot,” he says instead. He gives a gentle tug to Galo’s hair for good measure before sliding back down his body. 

Lio is fully aware they’ve both just had each other’s cum in their mouths, but he leans in to kiss Galo anyway. Galo meets him, and the result is warm and slow and sweet, both of them glowing and satisfied and unwilling to do much more than just this right now. Lio wants to drink down more of him, all of him, but he’s so loose-limbed from his orgasm all he can do is press their mouths together. 

He’ll have time for that, he knows. Now that both parties are aware of their relationship status, he has a feeling he’s going to find Galo a much more willing partner than he has up until this point. In his mind, the future stretches out before him, filled with good morning kisses and shared quiet moments and sex so good that their neighbors will hate them. 

Their lips still against each other, Galo manhandles Lio over his body until they’re both resting against the mattress, bare chest to bare chest. His arms curl all the way around Lio, pulling him close, and he smiles against his mouth in a way that makes Lio’s stomach swoop. For a man so large and strong, he’s surprisingly gentle where Lio is concerned. Not like he thinks he’ll break Lio, because they both know he can’t. But respectful, reverent, treasuring. Lio can feel Galo’s heart beating against him. 

When he pulls back to look at Lio, his hair flops roguishly into his face, and something in Lio’s chest shifts. This is his absolute dumbass of a boyfriend. And he wouldn’t trade him for the world. 

“So, Lio,” Galo says, eyes bright. “When can we do that again?”

“You have a lot of time to make up for,” Lio replies. “So whenever you want.” 

Galo’s eyebrows go up. “Now?” 

Lio answers his hopeful gaze with a look that he’s sure comes across as unamused, but as his hand on Galo’s chest traces down, over his hip, past the dimples on his lower back and over his tailbone, he allows it to morph into a smirk. He doesn’t hesitate to squeeze the handful of flesh he grabs. 

“Fine,” he agrees, and rolls on top of his boyfriend again. 


End file.
